Some people spend a whole lot of time telling each other what kind of sex is “natural” and what kind of sex is “unnatural”. But as I’ve discussed here, sexual reproduction only exists as a means of genetic mixing and doesn’t require a specific set of gender or sexual characteristics.
The Original Sex
“In the beginning it was Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve.” I don’t know if you heard that bad excuse for homophobia growing up, but I did. The problem is that it’s wrong in every possible way. There’s absolutely nothing correct about the statement.
So let’s start again and do it right: In the beginning there was one sex, and it was female.
An individual reproduced by growing a copy of herself and releasing that copy into the environment. This was certainly the case with the first self-copying molecule. Since life began with the first self-copying molecule, this means females are the first, original sex. In the beginning it wasn’t Adam and Eve – it was Eve.
In biblical terms, Eve begat Eve and Eve and Eve and one of those Eves had a mutation – that is, a slight genetic change – and begat a line of Evelyns. Some of these mutated further and begat lines of Ediths and Ednas. Meanwhile, the Eves were still busy begetting more Eves, but some of those mutuated and became Esmes and Esmereldas. So females were really doing pretty well before males came along, thank you very much.
The problems began when two of Eve’s daughters – let’s call them Edith and Esmerelda – started competing each other. And thus the evolutionary arms race began. The problem was made worse by the fact that Edith continued to mutate and got new advantages over Esmerelda. Meanwhile, poor Esmerelda didn’t always mutate fast enough to keep up. Many strains of Esmereldas were wiped out because of this, and that was the end of their evolutionary line.
But then a mutation took place that allowed some Esmereldas to swap genes with other members of the population. Members who were not Esmereldas. And this gene-swapping saved the day. That’s because some of these newly acquired genes allowed the New Esmereldas to compete successfully with that pesky Edith. True, the New Esmereldas were no longer pure Esmereldas, but by golly they were alive. So the New, Improved Esmereldas got ahead in the evolutionary arms race. And that is how sex was born. And it was good.
According to evolutionary biologist W.D. Hamilton, one major benefit of sexual reproduction is the ability to stay ahead of parasites. Parasites work by adapting precisely to a very specific host species. The only potential hosts that are likely to survive are those that have the ability to mix their genetics quickly through sexual reproduction and spread beneficial mutations through the population quickly, also by sexual reproduction.
Other biologists have also suggested that the gene exchange done by sexual reproduction also means that siblings are not exact copies of one another and are therefore less likely to compete directly with one another for survival. But one way or another, that’s what males are for. Males are genetic mixers. They speed up evolutionary change.
Male Sexual Strategies
Since a male’s genes can only survive by contributing to somebody else’s reproduction, males have evolved a wide variety of mechanisms for trying to persuade a female to mate with them.
There’s showing off. Everybody knows about peacocks using their tails to attract males, but did you know about Technicolor vomit? Crustaceans called ostracods vomit luminous mucous in order to attract mates. Isn’t that sexy?
There’s showering females with gifts. Humans do this. Did you know that bowerbirds do too? Male bowerbirds make really show nests in order to attract females.
There’s also trapping females. Trapping females is also known as rape. Rape is immoral, but evolution should never be taken for a good moral code. People sometimes get confused about this, but the natural phenomenon of evolution doesn’t have good morals or bad morals any more than gravity has good morals or bad morals.
There’s growing longer penises than the competition. This is what barnacles do. Because barnacles are stationary as adults, getting sperm to the nearest female is a challenge for males. To meet the challenge and compete, male barnacles can grow penises up to eight times the length of their own bodies.
Assumptions about Nature and Sex
Some people spend a whole lot of time telling each other what kind of sex is “natural” and what kind of sex is “unnatural”. But as I’ve discussed here, sexual reproduction only exists as a means of genetic mixing and doesn’t require a specific set of gender or sexual characteristics.
What we Now Know
So falls the argument from nature. In its place is the knowledge that there’s no such thing as an “unnatural” gender role. We know that any time a religion–or anyone claiming moral authority–says non-heterosexual sex is wrong because it’s unnatural, that is a lie. We know that we cannot allow the idea of what’s “natural” to be used as an excuse for the mistreatment of women, or men, or anybody in the LGBTQ+ community. We know that men don’t have god-given dominion over women, and humans don’t have god-given dominion over anything.
The earth and the living things on it are holy. That is, they are worthy of supreme respect. Not because they are supernatural, but because they are alive, and that is amazing and precious enough.
Courtesy : The Humanist,
July-August 2017
Abby Hafer
Doctorate holder from Oxford University, Faculty, Human Anatomy & Physiology, Curry College, Milton, USA.
